


To Read Between the Lines

by itsallaboutflowermetaphors



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Falling In Love, First Kiss, Love Confessions, M/M, Marco writes Horror, Rated Teen for swearing and discussion of horror, Strangers to Lovers, Writer!Marco, barista!Jean
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-24
Updated: 2019-12-24
Packaged: 2021-02-26 05:47:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,822
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21928444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/itsallaboutflowermetaphors/pseuds/itsallaboutflowermetaphors
Summary: Marco is a regular at the coffee shop Jean works at.Jean gets curious about what Marco writes for hours every day.Maybe Jean is what Marco needs to finish this project.Written for the JeanMarco gift exchange 2019.
Relationships: Marco Bott/Jean Kirstein
Comments: 10
Kudos: 36
Collections: JeanMarco Gift Exchange 2019





	To Read Between the Lines

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AtropaBelladonna](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AtropaBelladonna/gifts).



> Dear AtropaBelladonna, I hope you like it! 
> 
> Not Beta-read.

Jean noticed him a few weeks ago. He’s been working at the Hanji’s coffee shop for years, but this summer—it being a college break and all that—he’s taking more shifts and this new guy is always there by ten. 

He orders his drink, an iced soy mocha, and then sits at a table near the staff door. The table is kind of hidden the guy sitting on the upholstered bench against the wall. He opens a laptop and a journal and sits there scribbling and typing for hours.

The guy is about Jean’s age, early perhaps mid-twenties, has short dark brown hair and a lot of freckles. He’s always super kind, says please and thank you and smiles a lot.

At first Jean thinks he’s a student, in summer school, writing his thesis or something, but the guy never brings textbooks.

Jean watches because he’s bored. Trost in summer is boring, the college town deserted, here’s no essays to write, most of his friends are back home for the summer holidays. His own family lives just outside Trost and he can just do the 40 minute drive to see them. So he stayed in the city, and works extra shifts, mentally prepares for his final year. 

  
  


One morning, the guy is standing across the dark wooden counter from him, just handing over the money to pay for his drink, when Jean asks, “What are you always doing here all day anyways?” 

And, _ oh wow _ , he thinks,  _ that was a rough conversation starter _ .

The guy is quiet for a bit, and of course today is less busy so the entire shop is quiet except for the instrumental music emitting from the speakers and the AC blasting.

“Uhm, writing,” the guy answers eventually, he sounds a bit flustered and Jean doesn’t reply, just nods, decides there’s no need to keep this awkward conversation going.

He hands the guy his change and starts making his drink.

  
  


The next day the guy surprises him by still smiling at him and just generally acting af if Jean wasn’t super rude yesterday.

Jean feels bad, though, it takes him a bit of time to make up his mind, but a few hours later he places an other iced soy mocha on the guy’s table. 

The guy looks up, looks at the cup and then at Jean’s face, his mouth slightly open, eyebrows raised. 

“It’s on the house. Well, on me specifically. I wanted to apologize for yesterday, I didn’t mean to pry,” Jean says, a bit rushed. 

Oh,” the guy says, “It’s alright. I just didn’t expect the question. Maybe I should have, with me spending so much time here.”

He lets out a nervous laugh, “It’s creative writing. I’m trying to write a novel.”

“A novel,” Jean parrots.

“Yeah, it’s kind of weird to call it that. A novel, a manuscript or a project—you know— but I really want to write more and publish this thing.”

The guy smiles, rubs the back of his neck sheepishly. 

“No, no, It’s cool. I just didn’t expect that. Good luck with it”

The conversation ebbs out after that.

  
  


They start to talk more, though. The guy asks him about his day when ordering his drink, they exchange pleasantries, but Jean doesn’t know the guys name and it bothers him. So one day he asks.

“It’s Marco,” the guy answers, while accepting his mocha.

“I’m Jean,” Jean replies, because maybe the g- Marco wants to know his name, too.

“I know,” Marco says and Jean tilts his head to the side, as if it say ‘How?’ and Marco points at the name tag pinned to Jean’s apron.

Jean throws his head back dramatically and groans,  _ of course, of fucking course _ . Then he hears Marco giggle so he looks at him again and he has to smile, too.

A week later Jean puts another iced soy mocha down on Marco’s table and asks, “So, what’s your book about?”

“It’s horror,” Marco replies and gestures for Jean to sit on the chair across from him. 

Truth be told, Jean didn’t expect Marco to write horror, maybe it’s a bit narrow-minded, but Marco is so nice and horror doesn’t seem fit that. 

Jean sits down, he folds his arms on the table, elbows resting on it, hands hanging off the table and Marco starts to explain, “So psychological horror, right? I don’t care much for jumpscares and murder. I mean, it has its place, but I think I prefer my book to be scary without it.

The general idea is that there’s this woman and she gets involved in things she was never meant to be involved in, scary supernatural stuff happening without most people noticing it, but once she notices it, she sees this stuff everywhere and it scares her. But she also wants to fight it.”

Marco sounds excited, his voice getting faster during his explanation, his eyes lightening up. Jean nods, encouraging Marco to go on. 

Instead Marco sighs, “Though I just don’t know how to highlight her fear, she’s alone for most of the novel and it just doesn’t come across right.”

“Do you want my input?” Jean asks hesitantly. 

Marco shakes his head—no. “Maybe some other time. I feel like I need to figure this out myself.”

They talk some more that day, quite literally until Hanji tells him to get behind the counter. Jean learn that Marco is 24, which makes him just a bit older than Jean, a bartender by night and that his parents and four younger sisters live a few hours north in Jinae. Jean tells him that he studies engineering and that his 16-year-old brothers, they are twins, are sometimes literal nightmares.They exchange numbers, too. 

That Friday Marco asks Jean to read an excerpt and maybe suggest a few things if he has any ideas. He’s stuck, he says.

On Fridays Jean only works a short opening shift and he feels like Marco know this by now because less than an hour after Marco arrived and asked him Jean wipes his hands on his apron, hangs it up in his locker and punches out.

Then he walks over to Marco’s table, pulls out a hair next to him and sits down. 

“Hey,” he says, and, “Hit me with it.”

Marco murmurs a greeting and quickly types something on his laptop before adjusting it to face Jean. 

The document’s name is ‘Novel excerpt for Jean’. 

He smiles. The excerpt is good, Jean reads it twice, but he knows what Marco means when he says it isn’t quite right. 

“I like it a lot. And I have a suggestion. This might sound like a lot, but have you thought about changing the POV? Maybe first person would be better to drive deeper into her thoughts and make the introspection… smoother?” he asks softly. 

Marco looks at him like a light bulb just lit up above his head, seemingly delighted.

Jean didn’t expect that reaction after suggesting such a major change.

“Oh god, that makes so much sense! Why didn’t I think of that?”, Marco asks. 

“Sometimes it’s harder to see ways to improve something after looking at it for too long. Fresh eyes and all that…? Plus, using first person POV outside of YA is sometimes demonized?” Jean suggests.

Marco hums in agreement, he’s writing into the journal, Jean can’t quite read the tall, squished together letters further down, but he thinks the top of the page says, ‘suggestions by Jean’. Again, it makes him smile.

“Anything else?” Marco demands. 

Jean shrugs a shoulder. “I don’t think so. At least not for that part. Besides, the POV change is already such a gigantic edit to put forward. You know, you don’t have to do it.”

“It’s the right change to make,” Marco says smiling and he sounds so convinced by and confident in the decision. 

  
  


Marco keeps showing Jean bits, messages him from time to time, they talk about the novel on the phone and in person at the coffee shop during Jean’s breaks. 

They become proper friends, talk more and more about other interests. They go bowling—Marco beats Jean fair and square. 

Jean keeps making suggestions when Marco demands them. They emphasize the social critique, iron out how the government keeping the supernatural horrors hidden and protected enough to commit their atrocities in the novel is a metaphor for governments creating a climate of fear in real life. 

In the end, Jean helps Marco at many different points, but the novel still feels like Marco’s to Jean. 

He’s happy when Marco proclaims that the novel is finished at the end of summer break.

They keep hanging out after that, but now that Jean is busy with school again he's not able to spend as much time with Marco. It takes him another two months, but he realizes how much he likes Marco. How he has fallen in love with him. 

Jean doesn’t say anything. He’s too nervous. 

A few months later, December has just started, Marco suddenly calls him and asks if he can come visit Jean at his flat. He sounds nervous and perhaps excited. Jean is home so he agrees. 

Marco is out of breath, his long scarf hanging lopsided around his neck when Jean opens the door. 

“Hi, can I come in? I have a surprise for you,” he says very quickly and Jean has trouble processing it all, but nods. 

He shut the door behind Marco and then Marco swings his backpack off and pulls out a big yellow padded envelope and holds it out to Jean. “For you.”

The envelope is already torn open and Jean frowns at it. However, he also reaches into it almost immediately and pulls out a… book?

His eyes shoot up to meet Marco’s. “Is this?,” he asks. 

“Yeah, I mailed it to so many publishers and then an indie publisher picked it up! I wanted to surprise you with it.”

“Oh my god, this is amazing,” Jean tells him and hugs him.

Marco’s smile is wide, his dimples prominent and his eyes crinkled at the corners when Jean lets go.

“Take a closer look,” he urges. 

Jean lowers his gaze to the book still in his hands. The cover shows a purple-tinted desolate desert landscape, and in a clean white typeface ‘Trepidation’ and ‘Marco Bodt’.

“It’s beautiful,” Jean whispers in awe. 

“Keep going”

When he opens the book Jean can’t believe his eyes. 

‘For Jean. Without whom this book wouldn’t exist. I love you.’

Jean reads it again. And then it all happens so fast, he’s dropped the book, has a hand in Marco’s scarf and one cupping his jaw and he’s kissing him. Marco makes a noise of surprise, but then he’s kissing Jean back and it’s perfect. 

“God, I love you, too. Fuck, I have loved you for months,” Jean whispers against Marco’s lips between kisses. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading I hope you like it.  
> Comments or Kudos would mean the world to me.  
> The book stuff was heavily inspired by Alice Isn't Dead and to some degree Welcome to Night Vale. They are fantastic fiction podcasts.  
> Find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/RainySidewalk), [tumblr](http://itsallaboutflowermetaphors.tumblr.com) and [dreamwidth](https://allaboutflowermetaphors.dreamwidth.org)  
> I’m most active on twitter.


End file.
